


Wrecked, solitary, here

by venysri



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Mild Gore, Psychological, Short One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-02
Updated: 2018-06-02
Packaged: 2019-05-09 13:43:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,018
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14717183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/venysri/pseuds/venysri
Summary: Morgan’s psychotic episode in 8x16





	Wrecked, solitary, here

As much as he tried to focus on a spot in the dirt before him, Morgan couldn’t. He was restless, flicking his gaze towards the crowd before him, and then to the buildings. The conversations were reduced to a long, perpetual hum and he watched motion like it was bizarre, peculiar, though some part of him reasoned that it shouldn’t be.  It was like watching through glass, the world before him nothing but superficial.

He felt like a ghost, not entirely there, waiting and waiting. He didn’t remember what it was exactly that he was waiting for, just knew he had to be here and that he had to wait. It was something big, that was all he knew.

A sudden, unpleasant sensation crept up Morgan’s spine, making him shiver. It brought a wave of nausea washing over him like a ravelled sea. He glanced to the gathering of people a few meters away, various faces he felt like he knew, and even as none of them paid no mind, he knew somehow one of them was watching him. Scrutinizing him.  
  
But he found the subject of the unwarranted scrutiny was standing behind the crowd -- a lone, solitary figure with a self-satisfied bearing about him, giving Morgan a cruel and all too familiar sneer.  
The chatter Morgan had instinctively tuned out had suddenly poured into his comfortable silence, invading his ears with harsh, strange noise. He grimaced,  tried to look away but he couldn’t avert his eyes.

Blood trickled from the side of Jared’s rotting face, spilled down past his mouth -- which was convoluted into a wicked smirk -- and down his neck, staining his collar. “You know what it is!” he shouted.

In stunned silence, Morgan could only glare at him while reaching down and promptly retrieving the bo staff from the ground.

Jared watched his every move. The ruin at the side of his face spurted with even more blood as his mouth drew back into a wider smile, showing a row of blood-stained teeth. “You know what it is!” Jared shouted again, sounding out each word.

“No.” Morgan hissed. He shot up, bo staff raised with both hands, and started advancing towards him, but Jared had already taken off running, echoing whoops and cheers across the compound. His view was obscured as a few people passed by, and in a panic, Morgan barged past them in desperate attempt to locate his target again.

But then he stopped.

Several yards away, Jared was joined by someone else. The other stood slack, with a small bleeding wound at the side of his throat.

Gavin’s deadpan eyes pierced right through him.  His grip on the staff tensed as he held the man’s hard stare. “Where’s the rest of ‘em?” Morgan snapped. “The prisoners, where’s the rest of ‘em?”

“You were supposed to.” said Gavin.

Morgan watched the blood seep from his neck wound. Henry’s own making. Henry was dead. They’d killed him. He knew what it was.  He shook his head. “No.” he muttered. Something told him that wasn’t right, yet he knew with absolute certainty that it was. His breathing became heavy.

“YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO!”

Morgan was on them in an instant, advancing towards them with sheer rage. Jared would be the first to die.

The pair took off towards the gates before quickly splitting away in different directions. Each of them were like a blur of motion. They had vanished behind other people until Morgan had lost sight of them completely.  Everything seemed to have happened so fast at that moment that he had to stop in his pursuit. He spun around in panic, head snapping left and right.

Morgan suddenly felt very unsteady.  The environment seemed to slowly blur away, and all he could only hear a low ringing and the sound of his own labored breathing. He searched his surroundings despairingly. People moved around him completely oblivious.

“Morgan?”

He ignored the soft, feminine voice behind him and turned towards the gates -- it wasn’t what he was looking for; he was looking for his target. Gone. Nowhere to be seen. Dread clutched hold of him as his search became frantic. He was supposed to. He knew he was supposed to.

“Morgan, what is it?”

“They’re gone,” he muttered, turning to look behind him. He paid no regard to Carol, who stood by his side with brows drawn in concern. “They’re doin’ somethin’.”

A sharp rumble sounded from his left. It didn’t register to him at first, but he turned to look when the gates drew back with a loud, protesting groan. They opened to a flood of people pressing on towards the entrance. It was the prisoners.

Morgan’s reacted at once, his jaw set as he strode forward, staff raised with purpose. He set his eyes on one particular target -- the man in the white shirt -- and readied himself to attack.

Though before he could advance on his target, something hit him from the side. Morgan reacted fast, twirling his bo staff around and swinging it into the assailant’s stomach. The assailant was knocked to the ground with a grunt and Morgan hovered over him, staff raised in both hands and ready to hold off another attack.

The assailant rolled over, his dark brown eyes regarded the end of the bo staff inches from his face.

Morgan let out a breath as he beheld Henry gaping up at him, and his strained grip upon the staff promptly lightened. Everything came back to him then. He remembered why he was waiting, he remembered everything that was happening; he remembered everything he lost the ability to make sense of before. It all came rushing back like it always would -- frightening in its intensity.

The dead were dead. Henry was alive.  
  
A pair of hands took hold of his staff and gave a gentle tug. Morgan turned his head and found Carol looking at him carefully. She eased the bo staff from his weakening grasp, exercising slow caution all the while, and without any further hesitation, he let her take it.

The weapon now seemed repulsive to him.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I've never written anything like this before but I felt oddly compelled to. I hope I got his characterization right. Sad that there's not enough love shown out there for my guy Morgan :-(


End file.
